<p>I am going to go to Penn SEAS, and since it's ranked kind of low, I wonder if this would hurt my chances of going to a good graduate school or getting employed in engineering? I am currently devising plans to transfer to some better ones like MIT, Stanford or Cornell, and I know that transferring is extremely hard, I'll just give it a try and if it doesn't work, oh well.</p>
<p>What say you? Would I be shafted in the graduate school admissions or employment process, or would I be alright? If I'm destined for the shaft and assuming I won't be able to transfer, what do you think I should plan ahead so that I can be competitive as well?</p>
<p>The schools with the high overall ranking, but low engineering rankings (e.g. Harvard, Penn, etc) will open many doors, but those doors are primarily non-engineering based. So Penn engineers will have plenty of opportunity at investment firms, consulting firms, etc, but you won’t see too many major manufacturing companies on campus (you will see a few, though). Some people prefer this because the non-engineering positions tend to pay more and are more prestigious. </p>
<p>The big state school that rank high in engineering have fewer non-engineering companies coming to campus, but more manufacturing/engineering firms. So if your goal is to be an engineer, a top engineering school is a better option.</p>
<p>As for grad school - it won’t really matter that much. If you have good grades and good research, you’ll be able to get in from either school. If you want to join a highly competitive program or lab right out of your undergrad, it’s actually your undergraduate research advisor’s/reference’s connections that are more important, not your undergrad school.</p>
<p>“The schools with the high overall ranking, but low engineering rankings (e.g. Harvard, Penn, etc) will open many doors, but those doors are primarily non-engineering based. So Penn engineers will have plenty of opportunity at investment firms, consulting firms, etc, but you won’t see too many major manufacturing companies on campus (you will see a few, though). Some people prefer this because the non-engineering positions tend to pay more and are more prestigious.”</p>
<p>I see… But I guess I can go around myself looking for them though.
Does it mean that they look disfavorably upon Penn engineers? Or just that they come less to Penn and more to other places?</p>
<p>I can’t speak for every company, but in my experience, they don’t look down on schools like Penn, necessarily. There are two issues: the first is that Penn graduates tend to not stay in engineering. If a person had the stats to get into Penn, that person could have gotten into most of the top engineering schools. As a result, when you consider the type of person that goes to Penn (over one of the top engineering schools), you find that Penn students disproportionately care more about prestige (and non-engineering positions like consulting are more prestigious than manufacturing). In addition, most students know that going to Penn for engineering will push them more towards non-manufacturing positions, so there is some self-selection there. Manufacturing firms tend to avoid Penn because the above means that they’ll either get the “bottom” students without any other options or students that want 3 years of experience before pursuing an MBA. I’d rather have an above average Penn State student that will to stick around for 10 years than either of those.</p>
<p>The second reason - and this is going to be controversial but in the interest of being unbiased, I’ll throw it out - is that the level of education is different than at engineering-centric schools. I’m not commenting on any one school, but that type of school (very high overall ranking, low engineering ranking) tends to know that it’s students will not pursue manufacturing positions, so the schools tend to offer less core class material and more electives and minors in things like business, economics, foreign languages, etc. Now, I’m not saying that the education is poor - it’s still ABET-EAC, after all - but the material covered will not be the same as even a low overall, top engineering school (e.g. Georgia Tech). A good exercise to validate this is to look through the course requirements to graduate from multiple schools and pull syllabi from the same course.</p>
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<p>You can, but when your school’s Career Services department isn’t helping things become difficult. You won’t know when companies are hiring, and if the company posts externally, you’ll be thrown into the pile with hundreds of other applicants from schools that are not target schools (though you will standout in that pile).</p>
<p>Hopefully it is not a problem, though. If a manufacturing company does come to Penn, and you’re able to convince the recruiter that you’re genuinely interested in manufacturing, you’ll have a leg up in the process.</p>
<p>Thank you, G. P. Burdell. I will heed your advices. Maybe going to a graduate school for engineering may help? If I do that, then would I be qualified both for manufacturing and consulting (if I ever somehow choose to go to consulting)?</p>
<p>Another question: how difficult would it be for me to find jobs and internships as an engineering student of Penn?</p>
<p>it’s a bit obvious this kid is looking for prestige if he’s thinking of transferring to MIT/Stanford above all else.</p>
<p>so chucknorrisisgod, what kind of engineering companies are you trying to get into?</p>
<p>tier 1: Microsoft/ Google</p>
<p>they will actually look favorably upon UPenn grads (google esp.). i’ve been to both of their onsite interviews (w/ offers), and saw other candidates they were interviewing.</p>
<p>tier 2: lockheed, GE, United Technologies</p>
<p>these companies are spread across US and will hire majority of its kids from local-state-schools. you won’t be competing against MIT, Stanford, or even Purdue. you will be competing against UConn, Syracuse U, etc.</p>
<p>tier 3: (???)</p>
<p>if you want to get here, you obviously don’t want to transfer to MIT/Stanford.</p>
<p>As a graduate of Penn, you would be qualified to do both without a graduate degree. The question is, which companies will target Penn? The consulting companies will, the manufacturing companies are less likely to do so - you’ll have to pursue many of them on your own.</p>
<p>Actually, since you’re at Penn now, it would be interesting for you to contact your career services department and get a list of companies currently registered for the career fair. They should be able to give that to you (I can’t find it readily available online).</p>
<p>I doubt engineering employers would look down on an engineering grad of Penn, but I don’t know how many they actually see, or how actively they look there for talent. </p>
<p>Employers tend to look for talent at schools where there are likely to be a large number of candidates who are not only smart and qualified, but also interested in the jobs they are offering, so they can fill up their interview schedules and bring in some good engineers to the firm. That’s what the recruters are there to do. If a school has the reputation of producing engineering grads who don’t actually want to be engineers, they could be more lightly recruted by engineering firms, only for that reason.</p>
<p>I have no idea what Penn is like in this regard, but you might check at your engineering college job placement office/ career center to see what firms recruit engineers on campus, for what jobs. both how many engineering firms come, and who they are. That will give some idea.</p>
<p>If they interview there, that means if you are good enough you can get a job. They are not coming there for nothing.</p>
<p>If they don’t interview there you can still get a job but it’s more work for you, and the odds may be a bit worse.</p>
<p>Then, do the same at other colleges of interest.</p>
<p>X_Ray, I am sorry but you don’t seem to know what you are talking about.</p>
<p>First, year-to-year Microsoft statistically hires more engineers from UIUC than any other school. Yes it is a great school but it is not Penn or any of those ivy-type schools. Above all, Microsoft and google look for talent and creativity. They don’t favor any particular type of school (i.e. ivy vs state) as long as the school is reputable and the candidate is outstanding.</p>
<p>Also, Lockheed, GE, Boeing and UT are second tier to you? Honestly, you will find tons of top students from top schools at those companies. It just gets a little more watered down since they employ a lot more engineers than google.</p>
<p>“Also, Lockheed, GE, Boeing and UT are second tier to you? Honestly, you will find tons of top students from top schools at those companies. It just gets a little more watered down since they employ a lot more engineers than google.”</p>
<p>Do I have a chance at those companies assuming I do well in Penn?</p>
<p>Are they low for chem engineering since in the 2010 USNWR UPenn is ranked 26th which all things considered doesn’t seem that low to me. It may not be top 20 but it’s not bottom barrell.</p>
<p>“Are they low for chem engineering since in the 2010 USNWR UPenn is ranked 26th which all things considered doesn’t seem that low to me. It may not be top 20 but it’s not bottom barrell.”</p>
<p>True, but not being at the bottom of the barrel doesn’t cut it for me lol… Just trying to get to the top one day.</p>